“What shall I do, Lord,
with this quaint collection
of tribal anecdotes,
prophetic oracles,
psalms and proverbs,
intriguing narratives
- the record of your deeds and words
among a foreign people
so many years ago?”
“Search them.
You'll find
message and meaning,
faces and feeling,
symbols and signs.”
“Feed me, Lord.
Still my hunger....
and fill my basket
for the rest
of the day.”
It is surprising how we can take obvious things for granted. I remember living in Nijmegen, Holland, for a number of years and how getting around used to be a problem. I found my way by asking questions. I learned some of the bus routes that passed by the house where I was staying. I got to know one or two shortcuts. But it took me a long time to get something resembling a coherent picture. Then, one fine day a tourist stayed with us. She had a wonderful map of the town. Looking at it was a revelation to me. I traced the roads and streets that I knew and saw unsuspected connections. Suddenly it dawned on me that I had been a fool. I should have bought a map from the start! That would have saved me a lot of blundering about! I could have learned the routes methodically instead of finding out by trial and error.
The same frequently happens to our bible reading. Nobody teaches us how to do it. We simply start reading somewhere and blunder on, wondering where it will lead us. Perhaps we have a fixed time - say 15 minutes - and so we read in that period as much as we can. It might be from halfway through the chapter where we stopped yesterday to halfway through another chapter. After finishing one book in this manner, we embark on the next. Interesting ideas do strike us, of course, but they are soon stifled by our urge to read on and finish a good portion. We do retain some inspiration but much of it is lost as well. Is there a more profitable and methodical way of reading scripture?
There is. And it rests on certain presuppositions. The first is that we should make up our mind not to be in a hurry. I don’t mean to say that I am opposed to the fixed time every day. Usually that is a good idea. But, while keeping punctually to our time limit, we should refuse to rush through the reading or worry about how many verses we will complete. What we read we want to read well.
At the outset we say a short personal prayer. We ask God to speak to us in today’s reading. We promise that we will try to be responsive. There are a number of standard formulations for this opening prayer, but they won’t do. We will have to say something personal to God. It makes all the difference.
We then open the bible. When we start a new book with which we are unfamiliar, we read a short introduction to it. The same applies to sections within a book when we are dealing with complicated texts. The prophets, for example, may need a short commentary to go with them. Neglecting to acquire such information will reduce the chance of our penetrating to the real meaning of of the text. However, such explanatory study should be short and to the point. Reading the actual inspired text is, after all, the purpose of the exercise.
The next thing we should remember is that we should read together what belongs together. All writing can be divided into natural sections, into units of meanings. A psalm is one unit; a prophetic oracle another. The historical books can be divided into shorter narrations, incidents, remarks by the storyteller. In short, we read passages, not sentences.
When we read a particular unit, our attention will first focus on the main idea the author wants to convey. This is sometimes called the fundamental assertion. We reflect on what this means for our life. If we formulate it in a way that is truly meaningful to us, we call it the key message. Later we may make the analysis unconsciously but in the beginning, while we are schooling ourselves in the method of reading, we may want to do it more explicitly. We ask ourselves two questions: What did the inspired author want to tell us through this passage? How does it apply to me?
Perhaps, I should interrupt here. An example might clarify the procedure better than a description can. l Samuel 17:1-54 is one unit. It recounts the famous duel between David and Goliath. The purpose of the story can be inferred from what David says to Goliath:
“You are coming against me with sword, spear, and javelin, but I come against you in the name of the LORD Almighty, the God of the Israelite armies, which you have defied. This very day the LORD will put you in my power; I will defeat you and cut off your head. And I will give the bodies of the Philistine soldiers to the birds and animals to eat. Then the whole world will know that Israel has a God, and everyone here will see that the LORD does not need swords or spears to save his people” (l Sm 17:45-47).
The inspired author indicated his intention in these verses. He wants to teach that with God’s help we can overcome any opposition. How does this apply to me? I can overcome otherwise insurmountable obstacles if only I put my trust in him. So far so good. What next?
After establishing the main teaching of the story, we should read it a second time allowing the images to speak to us. As we read the words again we try to visualize what the author is saying as vividly as possible. We try to see it, as it were, with our mental eye. It does require some imagination, but the effort will pay off. One scene which will obviously stand out in our visual recapitulation is the fearful sight Goliath must have offered. Scripture presents him as a giant.
He was over nine feet tall and wore bronze armor that weighed about 125 pounds and a bronze helmet. His legs were also protected by bronze armour, and he carried a bronze javelin slung over his shoulder. His spear was as thick as the bar on a weaver’s loom, and its iron head weighed about fifteen pounds (l Sm 17:4-7).
Did the author exaggerate? He may have, but that is beside the point. Or rather, we should notice the exaggeration, and realize that the author is writing like this on purpose. He wants us to retain an unforgettable picture of Goliath! So we visualize him as well as we can: an enormous tower of a man, a walking tank, the incarnation of evil power and menace. In contrast we also visualize that simple country boy, David, who is only wearing a loin cloth.
He took his shepherd’s stick and then picked up five smooth stones from the stream and put them in his bag ( Sm 17:40).
The images confirm the main messages we had already discovered. They also awaken our feelings such as fear and disgust toward Goliath and admiration for David.
We are now ready to take another important step that I call creative elaboration. At this stage we shift our attention from the immeiate story to the hgiher truths and values it illustrates. Let us not forget that religion is ultimately about God and the borders of existence. All religious symbols, also the inspired words, are aimed at bringing us into contact with this ultimate reality. The story about David and Goliath was bound to time and place. But elements in the story are timeless and eternal. By creatve elaboration we try to catch some of those timeless and eternal aspects.
The reflaction will be very personal from now on. what impresses one person will not be so telling to someone else. but I will show one sequence of thought the David-Goliath story could lead us to. I am struck by the armour Goliath is wearing. It is enormous. It looks invincible. It covers and hides him.Suddenly I understand that this was precisely his weakness. The real Goliath inside the armour was very vulnerable. Just one stone from David’s sling can crack his skull! Yet Goliath put all is trust in his heavy protective mask.
The word mask triggers another train of thought. What mask am I wearing?
We all wear masks. We present ourselves to the outside world in a particular way, hiding our true selves. At times we spend a lot of energy on building up that mask. Other wise, we feel, we will not be secure. It becomes heavier and heavier. But inside we remain very vulnerable. Our true strength should lie in what we relly are, our true skills. David, though only protected by a loincloth , was much stronger. Now all this is reflection, if it happens properly, is not reasoned out as logically as I am doing now; it is apprehended, so to say, in a flash. we see armour, the mask, the image we are building up for ourselves as one reality. The many implications of this reality will rush in fro all sides. I may feel moved to hang onto this discovery and work it out as a value for myself.
Creative elaboration might also take a completely different turn. I might concentrate on fear. There are people who frighten me. I read about some of these people in the newspapers - senseless robbers who attack and mug lonely travellers, drunken drivers who may take my life by causing an accident. There are others I may remember from stories told me in my childhood days. Then again, there may be people in my immediate neighbourhood who make me afraid. why is it that I have this fear?
It may come to me that one reason may be my lackof self-confidence, or a lack of confidence in God. People may do me harm, true, but why should I fear them? If f ear menas being prudent, avoiding conflict and danger, it is a good thing. But if it mkaes me feel small and inadequate, I amgiving too much prominence to the Goliaths in my life. I should not run away from them and feeldefeated for the rest of my days. Like David, I should stand up and fighrt. They may not prove as formidable as they look. With God on my side I can be courageous and victorious as David. Again, this kind of creative elaboration is grasped in a simple insight rather than argued out in a long mental discussion.
these are just examples of the way in which ceative elaboration will go. Many of the chaters in this book indicate ways
and means of stengthening this elaborative process. The main point is that we should not just pass ovder the story in a hurry, but sit back, create visal images and allow the story to take us into the realm of eternal and timeless truths. Only then will the biblical reading achieve its full purpose, for we will grap a truth as we never did before and be attracted to it in our felings.
At this stage we should respond in prayer. It need not be long, but a personal response is called for. After all, it is almighty God who is speaking to us through these pages, and the truths that we have discovered come from him. So we tell him, simply and honestly, how we hope to live up to the discovery we have made.
If the text has been particularly helpful, we may want to memorize just one little phrase to carry with us till the next day. It could be: “You are coming agaist me with sword, spear and javelin, but I com against you in the name of the Lord Almighty” (1Sm 17:45); or, “You are just a boy and he has been a soldier all his life!” (1Sm 17:33); or any other phrase. The memorized phrase will help us retain the impact of the story and will gradually build p our familiarity with the actual text.
But reading scriptures like this is like a meditation, you will say. You are quite right. It is a reflective reading. During the first 10 centuries of the church most meditation was done in this way. The rule of St. Benedict, for example, does not prescribe a special time for mental prayer or meditation. But it does lay down “lectio divina,” “divine reading,” as a daily practice for the monks. By a prayerful reading of the Sacred Scriptures the monks were actually meditating and building up their spiritual lives.
The prophet Ezekiel recounts a strange vision:
I saw a hand reaching out toward me, and it was holding a scroll. The hand unrolled the scroll, and I saw that there was writing on both sides - cries of grief were written there, and wails and groans.
God said, “Mortal man, eat this scroll; then go and speak to the people of Israel.”
So I opened my mouth, and he gave me the scroll to eat. He said: “Mortal man, eat this scroll that I give you; fill your stomach with it.” I ate it and it tasted sweet as honey (Ez 2:9 - 3:3).
The prophet was asked to digest the divine message. By filling his stomach with God’s words, he could make them his own and preach them to the people.
Reading scripture means much more than getting acquainted with the text. It means absorbing God’s words and filling our hearts and minds with them, letting them become part of ourselves. Scrolls of papyrus don’t look appetizing. But this scroll will taste as sweet as honey!